Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a management system that performs processing for synchronizing setting data, an alternative management apparatus, a management method, and a storage medium.
Description of the Related Art
There has been known a management system that causes the clock time to match between a server and a client apparatus (see e.g. Japanese Patent Laid-Open Publication No. 2003-108539). In the management system, the client apparatus acquires a time kept by a server (hereinafter referred to as the “server time”) at the startup of the client apparatus, and stores a time difference between a time kept by the client apparatus (hereinafter referred to as the “client time”) and the server time. With this, in the management system, it is possible to easily achieve a match between the client time and the server time by adding the stored time difference to the client time, while eliminating the need for the client apparatus to always acquire the server time from the server. In the management system, for example, processing for synchronizing setting data of the client apparatus managed by the server is performed using the clock time thus matched between them.
Further, in Japanese Patent Laid-Open Publication No. H05-250281, there has been disclosed a time-keeping apparatus that notifies time information to a plurality of client apparatuses. The time-keeping apparatus serving as a master notifies time information to the client apparatuses, and in case where an abnormality arises in the time-keeping apparatus serving as the master, it is possible to switch the master time-keeping apparatus to a time-keeping apparatus that has been copying the time information.
However, in a case where an abnormality arises in the server disclosed in Japanese Patent Laid-Open Publication No. 2003-108539, there is a possibility that if the server is switched to an alternative server as described in Japanese Patent Laid-Open Publication No. H05-250281, it is impossible to maintain a match in time between the alternative server and clients.
For example, in a case where a time kept by the alternative server (hereinafter referred to as the “alternative server time”) does not match the server time, it is impossible to achieve a match between the client time and the alternative server time in spite of making use of the time difference between the client time and the server time. This causes a problem in processing for synchronizing setting data between the client apparatus and the alternative server.